Big Grove Tavern just won the 2015 Golden Beet Award for Restaurants and Institutions, which recognizes those that are paving the way for a local food system develop here in Illinois.
The winner is selected through a non biased committee and out of the entire state, Big Grove Tavern was chosen as the one that worked best with local farmers and to create a community-based food collaboration.
It’s truly a great honor, but Executive Chef Jessica Gorin and her team are still hard at work at the restaurant as usual, bringing in constantly new fresh creations inspired by the farmers’ market.
You can find all of the info in the press release below:
Big Grove Tavern wins 2015 Golden Beet Award.
Executive Chef Jessica Gorin and her team at Big Grove Tavern has been selected a winner of the 2015 Golden Beet Award for Restaurants and Institutions!
The Golden Beets are annual awards given out by Illinois Stewardship Alliance, a statewide non-profit organization that promotes local food and sustainable farming, in order to recognize those outstanding individuals, organizations, and businesses that are paving the way for local food system development through-out Illinois. That might entail anyone from the classroom teacher who is starting up her own school garden, to the restaurant whose core value is to buy locally produced food, to the activist group fighting for fair local food policy rights, or even the blogger providing local food recipes and gardening tips for the community. Six Golden Beets are awarded each year under the following categories: Farm to School, Restaurants and Institutions, Community Food Projects, Innovative Farmer, Scaling Up, and Other Varieties.
An unbiased selection committee made up of individuals involved in local food work around the state selected Big Grove Tavern as the winner of the Restaurant and Institutions category from all of the nominations that we received.
About Big Grove Tavern
Big Grove Tavern opened its doors in May of 2012 bringing the first true farm to table restaurant in the Champaign Urbana community. Executive Chef Jessica Gorin and Sous Chefs Terrah King and Tomasz Nilges draw inspiration from the local farmer’s market and utilize exceptional ingredients at the height of their season. Each menu reflects a solid commitment to using naturally-raised and organic ingredients sourced directly from local farms and farmers’ markets.
Our name comes from a large stand of trees called, “The Big Grove,” which offered shelter from the wide open prairie skies during the earliest days of our community. Now known as Busey Woods, you can still see the remnant of Big Grove in Urbana today.